Girls Rule

I absolutely never say "girls rule," as I have a son and a husband and I feel like the rest of that little sentiment (boys drool) is just mean...however! Just two days ago, Vice-President Kamala Harris was sworn in and for the very first time, a woman is in the White House, 2nd-in-command of the country and shattering glass ceilings forever. GIRLS RULE, BABY!

Okay, I think I got that out of my system for now. I am just so proud of this moment in our history that I could burst. But, instead, I'll share some girl art I've done in my Whimsical Girl Art Journal.

On this page, I used Tombow Markers on the flowers and added small amounts of water. The green is all colored pencils, as is the woman. I haven't doodled nearly enough on this page but I expect some quote that I like will end up here.

And for this page, I used Tombow Markers and white Uniball gel pen to doodle the heck out of these ladies. I used light water on these images too, which turns the marker into watercolor paint.

I love this image and even though I didn't have any earth colors or good skin color markers, I have some now, so I can make even more varied skin tones or hair tones. I might go back in and see how it works to layer some of these new colors on here. Very often I forget you can do that with watercolor paints.

Hope you're feeling as hopeful as I am with the new leadership in the White House!

Happy Friday,

Chark

It's a Jane Davenport Kind of Day

I encounter Jane Davenport's art just through social media and then found out she has books and classes and art media with her name. So I bought some paints and books and have been coloring and doodling along in my Whimsical Girls Art Journal ever since. I haven't yet opened my paints, but it's on the list of fun art stuff to do. She sells some of these images as acrylic stamps too, so check out this page if you're interested.

Here are some of my latest pages from the journal. I don't think I'm finished with the background, but I purposely faded the dresses just to do something different.

This page is on watercolor paper, so I think I'd better use some paint on this one or at least more marker and water. I added the quote and I'm sure I'll be adding more doodles.

I love this fun quote, though I wish I'd lettered in pencil first, because I'm not too keen on the lettering. I might fussy cut her and adhere to another page.

Happy Friday and have a whimsical weekend!

Chark

Power Poppy School Challenge

I love the digis over at Power Poppy and when I have a chance, I sit down and color some up. They have a new challenge each week and you can link up all month, and I was super inspired by the Back 2 School challenge. You have to raid the kids' stash and use school supplies—isn't that fun?

Here's my card, using the Power Poppy Lilac stamp. My mom had lilacs while I was growing up and I loved their strong scent and lovely purple flowers made of mini blossoms. Today I colored mine blue with my fabulous Tombow Dual Brush markers, but I can almost smell them anyway!

For my three school supplies, I used a staple for the patterned paper flags, a manila file folder that has been embossed with wood grain and a tab that says August that I sacrificed from my calendar. 

I'm not sure how many people still use file folders, but planners are definitely important to keeping the school year straight! And I sneaked in an extra supply if you count the regular copy paper I printed my digi stamp on. I don't often use fancy paper unless I'm planning some major mixed media.

Thanks for the inspiration, Power Poppy! Join in the challenge for a chance to win here.

Happy Wednesday!
Chark

Holiday Coloring

During the five-day Thanksgiving holiday, I spent some time coloring in front of the tv, watching This Is Us and Blindspot. 

Things I realize from this endeavor are that I need more light in my living room (although I did some purposeful coloring outside the lines if I planned to trim the image, I also have some not-quite-in-the-lines stuff I didn't intend), images can't be too small or I spend a lot of time trying to get it right and the point is having fun, not stressing and I love Tombow markers for their bright colors (which ok, I knew already but am loving the stained glass in these).

Here's an image from 2 Cute Ink digital stamps. The too-small version and the good-sized version. I don't have a brown Tombow, turns out so the cocoa is maybe white chocolate :) I used some of my Sparkle Noir pens to add a touch of color and sparkle...you can see it on the big cup handle a little. I get way more sparkle from these than the Wink of Stella.

This one is an image from Dawn Nicole that I shared on my blog last week. It's a full page here, so I think it's going in my art journal. It's done in Prismacolor pencils.

This is a free image I found here at 101 Coloring Pages and is perfect with the Tombow Brights.

This last one can be found on my blog too, linked to the original site. I love coloring flowers, but I think using Gamsol with the pencils would've made for better flower blending. This one I also printed a little small. Also, this is a lot of flowers to color...Live and Learn!

Did you do any crafty things over the weekend?

Happy Monday!

Chark

Altenew Peony Bouquet Redux

Visiting the Peony Bouquet stamp again in this post. You gotta admit, it's a good one. It comes with outline stamps, which are great for coloring and then you get the layered stamps too, you get blossoms, leaves and berries. What more could you want?

This one uses the outline stamp and then I watercolored with Tombows.

For this, I stamped the outline in Distress Inks so that when I used the Tombow markers and water, the outline would become part of the paint. I added white Uniball white pen for some highlights.

I love how the Altenew floral color layering stamps make me feel like an artist! 

Next, I want to try color layering stamps with one color, like in this Jennifer McGuire's video. Seriously, this woman is crazy talented...idea after idea and her technical skills in creating makes her a rock star.

Happy Friday!

Chark

Altenew Peony Stamping

I'm so jazzed about the Altenew Peony Bouquet set, I'll probably have to feature it all week. As far as coloring layering stamps go, Altenew was the first I saw on blogs and I was so impressed. I found the set at my lss and they came home with me. 

Today I have a project using the technique I saw on Jennifer McGuire's blog. She used a black marker after stamping to create the black background for her stamping. They look so cool against the black. She embosses her images, but I just stamped and colored the black carefully.

I watercolored the peonies with Tombow markers, I love these markers for their vibrancy. The sentiment is a die from Lawn Fawn and it gets a lot of use here at my house.

Happy Monday!

Chark

Turtles Times Two

I just colored up my 2 Cute Ink August stamps, including these cute turtles. The first one is done with Tombow markers and watercolored. I didn't use good paper, so it warped, but I still like it better than the other one, which is done in Prismacolor pencils. I prefer to color in pencils, but I feel like the watercolor was perfect for the turtle.

I actually used a copic in light aqua to go over the pencil to smooth it out and that worked fine, though it's probably not great for the tip of the copic marker...but my copics are kind of my last choice for coloring for some weird reason. They're even drying out! So I'll have to refill and start using them more.

If you like cute, you gotta check out Heidi's digi stamps at 2 Cute Ink. 

Happy Friday!
Chark

Watercolor Birthday Card

Watercoloring is so popular right now and I think for good reason. It's easy, it can be inexpensive, and you don't have to be a trained watercolor artist to get lovely results, especially for cardmaking. 

For this project, I tried Carolee's Creations paintables in the Happy theme.

I painted them with different watecolor media, and for this one I used Tombow Markers, they are water-based and you can scribble them on a clear stamping block and then add some water. They are the brightest colors for painting that I've found.

The geometric paper is Doodlebug and the textured blue paper was in a grab bag at Michael's. Here's a similar paper if you're interested. The only complaint I have with that paper is that you have to use some strong adhesive, because the texture makes it tricky to adhere anything to it.

Happy Wednesday!
Chark

And Sometimes You Fail

Ok, I saw a great tutorial on painting canvas sneakers here at Make It With Me and I had a little canvas bag that I wanted to spruce up...so I gave it a shot. 

Let me just say, she makes it look easy! First, canvas bleeds a lot, which I kinda knew, so perfection isn't happening. Second, I should've practiced on something less expensive (yes, it's a 31 bag). Third, I'm not giving it as a gift as I first intended. But I guess that means is that I'll be using the little bag and not showing it off to friends :) Well, except you, my crafty friends who have been there before...right?! Tell me things haven't worked out for you!!

I love Oz, as you probably know, and Glinda has got to be my fave. So I used my Tombow markers as watercolors (scribbled them on an acrylic block and used a brush to apply) and then spritzed with water throughout the process. In the shoe tutorial, Kellie spritzes before starting and not throughout, so that definitely means my paint moved during the process. But I didn't want the color too defined, so I tried it. Mostly it just diluted lots of colors and smooshed them into each other.

On the back side of the bag, I knew what would happen, so I stamped flowers in distress inks and deliberately spritzed after. I kinda like the star burst effect. I may go back in and stamp clearer images on top, but I haven't decided. I may even write words or something.

 

All in all, I learned a lot, and I can't count that as a fail, but it didn't live up to my expectations, so I can count that part as a fail. I think it just means I will be buying more canvas to practice on (and I'll get it at the dollar store!) In the meantime, I'll have to do some more research!

Happy Wednesday!

Chark

Christmas For Whovians

I haven't watched the new season with the new Doctor, but I will once it's out on DVD. In the meantime, I made this card to submit to Papercrafts Magazine before they closed their doors. Susan Opel did, in fact, love it though she doesn't watch Dr. Who, so that made me happy. I have a couple of projects coming up in the last online edition—January/February—which also makes me happy, even though the loss of the mag is felt. 

Here's my last submission card. It's the Tardis (blue phone box time machine)—the stamp came from Viva Las VegaStamps. They have some very artsy and fun images, including a steampunk octopus or two!

If you want to create a vortex of sorts like I did, get some Raspberry, Cranberry and Ocean Blue Adirondack alcohol inks, drip them on acetate (stamp packaging here) and lightly swirl with the felt applicator. Let dry, trim and adhere to white cardstock to really show off the color. I used dot adhesive in just a few places so it didn't show through too much.

I stamped the Tardis, colored with color pencils and also Tombow markers, trimmed it out and then popped it slightly up with dimensional tape.

The sentiment is also Viva Las VegaStamps and goes right along with this card. River Song is played by Alex Kingston and her signature phrase is "Hello Sweetie."

Hope you have a happy Monday,
Chark

AAAAEEEEIIII!!!!

If you've ever read horror comics, you know the title of this post happens a lot in the pages...a lot. My older sister, Julie, used to read those comics and then pass them along to me. I loved reading them, although I'm much more of a scaredy-cat than she is and I think she might've warped my young mind. However, it didn't stop me from picking up House of Mystery, Tales from the Crypt, Believe It or Not and The Witching Hour.

So for her birthday, I made copies of a b&w comic I found at a book sale and turned them into coasters.

I had some cork coasters from the craft store and I used them to trace around some classic pages. Y'know with screams and sounds and horrified looks. Then I colored them with Tombow markers. 

(Now, if you're bright, and you know that Tombow markers can be used as watercolors, then you're probably asking why I used them. I dunno, except I like how bright they are.) Turns out that Mod Podge will make the Tombow markers bleed a little when you seal them. But just the red ones. Weird and unhelpful, but that's my experience.

Luckily, my sister will forgive me for this...I hope. First I applied the Mod Podge carefully to the back of the circle and adhered them to the cork circles. You have to cover the entire back of the paper or it will buckle as it dries. I put a book on top of them to make sure they didn't get wrinkles as they dried. 

Then I applied a top coat (you should probably do this fast and lightly so the marker bleeds less). After that initial coat dries, apply another coat and let dry. Then one more and apply it to the edges too.

If you see Julie, don't tell her what I made (I'm sending them out today)!

Happy Wednesday,
Chark